Tuesday, January 09, 2007

I'm hiding in HondurasI'm a desperate manSend lawyers, guns and moneyThe shit has hit the fan

- Warren Zevon

NewsLandis gets more legal help. Guess that's where the FFF money is going. This apparently happened in December, being announced now. The timing would also explain why the FFF was created when it was. Here's a older video profile of Maurice Suh when he was with city hall.

Landis' shot back at Mr. Pound is all over the place, mostly wire stories reprinted.

FoxSports has the best headline of the day; Eurosport notes that Landis blasts Pound, BBC Sport notes how angry Landis is at the lastest Pound remarks. CNNInternational publishes the Reuters, The San Diego Union Tribune. There's a least a couple of dozen of 'em. We won't pick up more unless there's something novel in them. A comment to this post observes that many of the articles omit the 'violating virgins' quote, making Landis' reaction seem less justified. MSNBC gets in on the fun as well.

CyclingNews poll rates the Tour as the #1 event; of the top 10 shown, Landis won 4, which CN doesn't mention.

PodCastsThe FredCast 50th anniversary show talks about Mr. Pound, Landis's reaction, and the FFF.BlogsRant looks at AAF rates and sanctions vs Mr. Pound's hyperbole, and comes up scratching his head the same way we did way back when.

Velochimp has problems not only with the things Dick Pound has to say, but also with Pat McQuaid's statements, and thinks Mr McQuaid should just give it up.

UltraRob askes the race promoter of the Leadville 100 whether Landis could race there this summer if he loses the case, and is suspended. His answer is highly entertaining:

I asked if he was concerned that NORBA wouldn't allow Landis to compete. Wrong question. I mean, really wrong question. I found out that Ken "doesn't give a flyin' f**k what NORBA thinks, it's his d**n race and if Landis wants to ride, he's in." (I guess the lottery thing isn't 100% for everybody huh?) Then, and I quote, "And one more thing. If NORBA's supposed to be connected with USA cycling, then why the hell wasn't the people in charge of USA cycling standing by a USA cyclist who was being framed by the f****n' French? Bunch of pissant p**sies."

Then he got warmed up, and it goes on...

CyclingLogue notices that Dick Pound has once again lashed out at Landis:

Whatever you might think about the whole Landis affair, one would hope that the guy in charge of policing the riders would show a wee bit of professionalism around the whole thing.

Cycling Commentary'sTDarling notes that Landis is "pissed at Pound", finally looks at the slide show, and thinks maybe Landis has a case.

4 - Probably convinced by Tyler Hamilton’s experiment, Floyd Landis gets twice as smart. He has created a foundation modestly called the Floyd Fairness Fund whose goal is to collect small change to help him prove his innocence.

Are you going to strike the blow, or should I take care of it? It is strictly forbidden to donate to the Landis fund--never mind the tax credit--if you participate in the Red Flame.

5 - More pleasant to our ears, recent remarks from Dick Pound, who has not lost anything of his liveliness: [quotations in English]: "He" (editor's note [that is, Red Flame's note]: Floyd Landis) "was 11 minutes behind or something, and all of the sudden there’s this Herculean effort, where he’s going up mountains like he’s on a goddamn Harley."

The best:

[Quotations in English] "I mean, it was 11 to 1!" (editor's note [that is, Red Flame's note]: he is speaking about the ratio of testosterone-épitestostérone found in Landis' urine) "You’d think he’d be violating every virgin within 100 miles. How does he even get on his bicycle?"

Do you need a translation? It is, in any case, some great Pound!

Racejunkie thought it was a slow news day, until he saw the Landis response to the Pound statements of Sunday:

Dick Pound, who joyously convicted Landis in a neat one-man guillotine routine in the pages of the rather oft-read Sunday New York Times magazine, completely ignoring the tactical contributions of the peloton on Landis' stage to Morzine for a cycling-ignorant public, and further managing to tar him as a presumptively pervy ball o' raging man-stud illicit hormones, claiming that with his testosterone levels, "you'd think he'd be violating every virgin within 100 miles. How does he even get on his bicycle." Floyd, if your !@#$%^ legal team can't get your case tossed over this crap, or at the very least a huge defamatory chunk o' change gouged out of this guy, I swear you'd be better off hiring the last moron to prevail without even a lawyer on "Judge Judy." Landis' camp, of course, has at least managed to smack back that his testosterone level was fine, his epi was low, and that boy does this look biased. A good start, to be sure, but for my money, until you've made him hire a $450 an hour attorney, you haven't made him cry. Pick it up Floyd!

ForumsAt the Bicyling Magazine Forums, "Super Dave" supports Mr. Pound and claims to have found a reference to "Roid Floyd" pre-dating 27-July, so far unsubstantiated. The earliest Google hit I find is one calling him "No Roid Floyd", on 20-July -- after S17.

Total Poindexter Website Prize: to the fabulous geniuses over at trustbutverify, who not only are perhaps the most impassioned defenders of Floyd Landis' virtue beyond only the boy himself, but actually seem to understand the detailed scientific arguments they put out that the rest of us (well, me) are too stupid to even coherently summarize. Floyd, you better be innocent, or you owe these folks a *major* freakin' apology! (racejunkie)

"Who does awards for blogs? I sense a nomination is in order." (Carlton Reid, of BikeBiz)

"Hands-down champion of full-and I mean full-coverage of this hearing is the blog Trust But Verify. You'll have to have excellent background knowledge of the issues, and wade through page after page of detail to get to anything interesting, but it's raw and unfiltered and all there. The guy who runs the site, a cycling fan from Northern California, began casually providing a clearinghouse for Landis case news nearly 10 months ago, and now he has the haunted look of a man whose life has been hijacked and wants it back. (Loren Mooney, co-author of Positively False, at Bicycling)

"if you want the latest news on the Floyd Landis case, Trust but Verify is the go-to site. The author is biased in favor of Floyd (so am I) but the reporting is neutral and comprehensive." (12string musings)

About Me

About Us (Admissions)

TBV is personally biased towards Floyd. I think it'll be a better world if he proves his innocence, and some inquisitors meet their own just ends. Interspersed between daily link roundups are pieces of commentary slanted towards understanding what will prove innocence in the discipline proceeding, and what will rehabilitate his reputation in the public eye. Make of them what you will. Agreement with me is not required, though I am right.